Seven-foot two-inch Andrews Osborne Academy basketball player Nick Detlev will play in the News-Herald Classic on March 29.

It has been a memorable season of firsts for Andrews Osborne’s Nick Detlev.
The senior center earlier this year became the first boys basketball player at the school to reach the 1,000-point plateau for his career. A few weeks later, Detlev became the first boy from his school to be named all-Ohio, when he earned Division IV third-team honors.
This weekend, Detlev will add to his season of firsts when he becomes the tallest player — 7-feet-2 — to play in The News-Herald Classic.
He will also become the first second-generation player to participate in the basketball extravaganza at Lakeland Community College, where the best boys and girls from The News-Herald area gather for one last game. His mother, Marcia (Wallace) Detlev played in the N-H Classic in 1985 as a representative of the Madison Blue Streaks.
“I heard she made a lot of points off a hook shot, which I do, too,” Detlev said. “So that’s kind of cool.”
Though a number of years have passed since Marcia donned a brown T-shirt in the N-H Classic, she remembers the game well, and looks forward to watching her son play in the same game she competed in nearly 30 years earlier.
The N-H Classic is set for March 29 at Lakeland Community College, with the girls all-star game starting at 11 a.m. and the boys game tipping off at 1 p.m.
“It was kind of cool,” Marcia said of her Classic performance. “Back in the day, girls didn’t go to play at college unless you were really, really good. I remember the feeling of wanting to come together and show I can hold my own against the other girls.”
The bond between mother and son is a strong one in the Detlev household. Nick’s father, Brian, died of a heart issue when Nick was 11 years old. A teacher at Central Middle School in Euclid, Brian Detlev collapsed in the classroom. Nick remembers being taken to the hospital and finding out his father had died.
The fifth-grader was devastated.
“It shook me up quite a bit,” he said.
The coming months, even years, were a struggle, understandably. Marcia described the six months following her husband’s untimely death as “rough.”
Nick agreed.
“I took two weeks off from school,” he said. “Middle school was rough for me because my dad was gone. My grades suffered, too.”
Eventually, Nick found a niche.
Some of it might have to do with basketball, a bond he and his mother shared. While Brian Detlev, at 6-foot-10, was more into swimming, it was the 6-foot-1 Marcia who got her son going on the basketball court.
“When I first started to play, she taught me how to shoot a layup and a foul shot,” Detlev said. “Until she couldn’t guard me anymore, then she was like, ‘Nope.’ ”
Detlev at first went to Notre Dame-Cathedral Latin for his high schooling. But after one year, he transferred to Andrews Osborne. He credited his academics and tight bond with Coach Nate Barnes as the driving factors for transferring.
“He had some rough months in middle school,” Marcia said, “but he’s just blossomed in his high school years. His grades have gone through the roof, he works in the gym seven days a week, his coach works with him.”
The transformation was aided greatly by the man who has stepped into the Detlev’s lives, Rich Bloor, who Nick calls his stepfather.
“He’s helped a lot,” Detlev said. “He’s been a great help for me in my basketball career and in my life.”
With his life pieced back together, Detlev led Andrews Osborne to a 23-win season this year and a championship in the Lake Effect Conference. He averaged 19.5 points, 14 rebounds and six blocks per game.
While Detlev doesn’t have any Division I college offers yet, he said 10 have contacted him about the possibility. The list includes Cleveland State, Eastern Michigan, Florida International, Florida Gulf Coast and Siena.
“One coach just called me and wanted to get a tape from the (N-H Classic),” Detlev said.
Down the road, Detlev said he might major in international business, a field in which he gained interest by going to school with so many international students at Andrews Osborne. He would also like to add 10 or more pounds to his 225-pound frame before college basketball begins.
But first he looks forward to one last game as a member of high school — ending his career the same way his mother did nearly 30 years ago.
At the News-Herald Classic.
“It’s amazing,” Marcia said. “The really cool part is I don’t think he’s had his breakout game yet.”